Talk:Jean-Baptiste Lamarck/Archive 1

Extraordinary inaccuracies and misconceptions
It is not those who misunderstand the basic concept of "selection" that reject Lamarck. It is almost without exception that those who defend Lamarck have utterly no concept of selection or fitness. While I agree with the summary of selection given, to say that those who don't understand that definition reject Lamarkianism is the most absurd strawman I have read in quite some time. Also, the fact that memetics is Lamarkian is a case against memetics as a true parallel to evolutionary biology, not a point for Lamarkianism. Evopsycho 20:27, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Algae
"...the first species to be described was the unicellular Porphyridium purpureum (Byssus purpurea Lamark, 1778. Bysus then included colonial as well as filamentous organisma...(Brodie, J.A. and Irvine, L.M. 2003. Seaweeds of the Brtitish Isles.'' Vol. 1 Rhodophyta part 3B Bangiophycidae. Natural History Museum, London. ISBN 1 898298 87 4 —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Osborne (talk • contribs) 12:36, 31 January 2007 (UTC). Osborne 12:37, 31 January 2007 (UTC)!

Page move
I think this page should be moved to his full name and title, to be of the same form as Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon. Comments? (There are a whole bunch of redirects to tidy up as well, but I wasn't going to start those before asking.) Noisy | Talk 12:55, Dec 19, 2004 (UTC)

Absolutely; Lamark was NOT his family name, but a title. Many Wiki names have been shortened from much-used forms (Thomas Henry Huxley) to seldom-used forms which are shorter (Thomas Huxley). But in cases like Lamark it is dreadfully gauche to conflate family names with titles. Jean Baptiste Pierre Antoine de Monet, Chevalier de Lamarck is accurate, but rather long. I think I'd go for simple Lamark folowed as now by the full name as a sub-title. Macdonald-ross 20:13, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

horrible horrible article
Odd that this article should be about Jean-Baptiste Lamarck, when most of is an unstructured rambling mess mostly duplicating Lamarckism. &mdash; Dunc|☺ 16:56, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

And while we're at it, how does it follow from his family's poverty that he was a Chevalier? Nothing to do with it! Macdonald-ross 11:24, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

Invertebrates?
We have here the great founder of invertebrate biology. So while the attention to his pioneering on evolution is merited, so is at least a little more to the great anatomical and systematic work he did separating out invertebrate groups from the mess of "worms" that Linnaeus had. (In addition, the discussion of the extent to which he was/wasn't the person responsible for promoting inheritance of acquired characters is handled well in the first, shorter telling of his life at the beginning, but not so well in the longer version later). Felsenst 06:43, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Awkwardness in opening paragraph.
The flow of this paragraph is awkward and contains seemingly irrelevant information.

"At his post in Monaco, Lamarck became interested in natural history and resolved to study medicine [2] He retired from the army after being injured in 1766, and he returned to his medicine studies.Lamarck showed a particular interest for botany, and he studied the subject under Bernard de Jussieu for nearly ten years. He was one of the main contributors to the Cell Theory."

Is it necessary to say he was in Monaco? Was there something about the flora or fauna there that led to subsequent discoveries?

He resolved to study medicine only to become a botanist. Do we need to know that he studied medicine? Did he study medicine? Either we explain this further here or omit it.

Choosing to omit the detail about medicine, how about the following rewrite?

"While in the army, he found time to explore natural history, and resolved to pursue the subject upon his discharge. In 1766 an injury required that he retire from the army. Lamarck returned to school. He spent the next 10 years under the tutelage of Bernard de Jussieu during which time he demonstrated a particular affinity for botany, and eventually became one of the main contributors to the Cell Theory. " --General Ludd (talk) 03:40, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

link, please!!
I cannot access this page from its title Jean-Baptiste Lamark -- what's going on?? Macdonald-ross (talk) 09:34, 27 February 2008 (UTC)


 * You misspelled his name; it's LamarCk. Dissembly (talk) 00:34, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

Urban Myths
This page is absolutely full of scientific "urban myths" about Lamarck; Dissembly 01:49, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
 * He did not come up with acquired inheritance; it was the standard folk knowledge of his era (and, i might add, Darwin did in fact believe in acquired inheritance, despite the claims of this article).
 * His actual theory of evolution is explained in detail in Gould's "The Structure of Evolutionary Theory", which draws solely upon primary documents - i suggest we set about correcting the myths. A century of hopelessly innaccurate textbook description is long enough!
 * The reference to Weismann's mouse experiments are also a potential urban myth - it needs to be doulbe-checked.
 * I have attempted to rectify all these problems. There is now a section specifically for his evolutionary theory. - Dissembly 04:32, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
 * I just started working on the article a few days ago, and I hadn't got to his evolutionary theory yet. I've detailed his early life and his publications in the early 1800s. Just a request, could you find the exact page in Gould's book that you're referencing to? Page 170 to 197 contains a lot of details, and I think it would be easier for readers if the exact page number(s) were provided. Nishkid64 (talk) 16:56, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Pages 170-197 is a whole study on Lamarck; i don't think it would make much sense to cite a single page, because the information on Lamarck is spread out over all of those pages. What specific bit of information do you need a reference for? Dissembly (talk) 00:36, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
 * If you want some source info about Darwin's belief in acquired inheritance, see Talk:Vestigiality. According to Leakey, Darwin called it "use-and-disuse heredity" and tried to account for it by his pangenesis theory in his 1868 book Variation of Plants and Animals Under Domestication. .. dave souza, talk 22:12, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

WP:Reliable sources
All contributors work under guidelines. This is basic to the whole of WP:
 * 1. Where there is any difference of opinion, reliable sources take precedence over the opinions of contributors, no matter how strongly they feel, and how eminent they may happen to be.
 * 2. The most reliable references are those in refereed high-impact journals, and in books from major publishers which have attained status by reviews &c.
 * 3. Web-sites are by their very nature less reliable since they are almost never refereed and tend to be the opinions of a single person and ephemeral in nature. However, they have higher status than the unsupported opinions of a contributor.
 * 4. It follows from all this that passages clearly supported by a reliable reference should not be removed from the article without consensus, and in particular, should not be replaced by personal opinion. If more than one view is taken in the sources, then they should be represented in the article.
 * 5. This is the place to voice ideas and criticisms of an article, not in the article itself. However, it is pointless to rail against text which is supported by reliable references. Macdonald-ross (talk) 13:21, 7 July 2009 (UTC)


 * It doesn't need saying, but of course Macdonald-ross is correct. Johnuniq (talk) 00:38, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

The following question occurred lately
Is the Family of Jean-Baptiste Lamarck (Chevalier de la Marck) somehow connected to the House of Marck/ de la Marck? This German noble Family started its rally to the Power in Westfalia and was orientated to Burgundy. Familiy members are to find in higher Ranks of France, Burgundy and the HRE during the 16th century and earlier. (Dukes of Nevers/ Princes of Sedan etc.) The Dukes of Cleves are representing the main Line of the House de la Marck. Infortmations about the Familiy of Jean-Baptistes Father (also Chevalier de la Marck) and his ancestry would be very welcome. --Gabriel-Royce (talk) 01:14, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

Darwin did not reject Lamarckian use/disuse inheritance. Rather he adopted it as an important evolutionary selector.
Oddly, the article doesn't even mention this very common name for Lamarck's theory in the opening paragraphs (so I fixed it). Instead, the article mentions a genetic theory (which Lamarck couldn't possibly have held) called "soft inheritance" (which may or may not become an accepted term in science but certainly was not a term Lamarck could have used - nor is use/disuse theory the same thing as soft inheritance. If it were, scientists today would go back to the original term, as they are very prone to acknowledging early work if it is the same as later work.  Soft inheritance /= use-disuse.  Also, there is no citation, but I do have a reference for my change and I'll insert it.  When I get a chance I'll find the actual page number.  May be able to do that soon.  This article is indeed a mess.LéVeillé 17:02, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

The article currently claims in its 'Legacy' section:

"Charles Darwin specifically rejected Lamarck's mechanism whilst praising him for "the eminent service of arousing attention to the probability of all change in the organic... world, being the result of law, not miraculous interposition." [30] "

and the citation for verification in its footnote 30 is as follows:

"Darwin, Charles. Origin of Species, editions 3 to 6, Historical introduction "

But the claim that Darwin "specifically rejected Lamarck's mechanism" is (i) mistaken Original Research and (ii) its apparent cited source is a failed verification.

(ii) For nowhere in his paragraph on Lamarck in his introductory 'Historical sketch' referred to here does Darwin reject Lamarckian use/disuse inheritance. (i) And in fact he adopted it himself and advocated it as an important selector in the evolution of species, along with natural selection, as the Wikipedia Evolution article currently confirms, as follows:

"..Darwin could not explain the source of the heritable variations which would be acted on by natural selection. Like Lamarck, he thought that parents passed on adaptations acquired during their lifetimes,[201] a theory which was subsequently dubbed Lamarckism.[202]"

And as Ernst Mayr attested to Darwin's Lamarckism in his 1964 Introduction to the Harvard Uni republication of the Origin first edition:

“Curiously few evolutionists have noted that, in addition to natural selection, Darwin admits use and disuse as an important evolutionary mechanism. In this he is perfectly clear. For instance,…on page 137 he says that the reduced size of the eyes in moles and other burrowing mammals is “probably due to gradual reduction from disuse, but aided perhaps by natural selection.” In the case of cave animals, when speaking of the loss of eyes he says, “I attribute their loss wholly to disuse” (p137) On page 455 he begins unequivocally, “At whatever period of life disuse or selection reduces an organ…” The importance he gives to use or disuse is indicated by the frequency with which he invokes this agent of evolution in the Origin. I find references on pp. 11, 43, 134, 135, 136, 137, 447, 454, 455, 472, 479, and 480. “ [pages xxv-xxvi of Mayr’s Introduction to the 1964 Harvard University Press publication of the 1859 Origin.]

Thus I propose the above sentence be changed to the following:

"Charles Darwin specifically adopted Lamarck's mechanism as an important evolutionary selector amongst others, such as natural selection, [Fn] and praised him for "the eminent service of arousing attention to the probability of all change in the organic... world, being the result of law, not miraculous interposition." [Fn+1] "

along with the following appropriate verifying footnotes

<Fn: Ernst Mayr attested to Darwin's Lamarckism in his 1964 Introduction to the Harvard University republication of the Origin first edition as follows: “Curiously few evolutionists have noted that, in addition to natural selection, Darwin admits use and disuse as an important evolutionary mechanism. In this he is perfectly clear. For instance,…on page 137 he says that the reduced size of the eyes in moles and other burrowing mammals is “probably due to gradual reduction from disuse, but aided perhaps by natural selection.” In the case of cave animals, when speaking of the loss of eyes he says, “I attribute their loss wholly to disuse” (p137) On page 455 he begins unequivocally, “At whatever period of life disuse or selection reduces an organ…” The importance he gives to use or disuse is indicated by the frequency with which he invokes this agent of evolution in the Origin. I find references on pp. 11, 43, 134, 135, 136, 137, 447, 454, 455, 472, 479, and 480. “ [pages xxv-xxvi of Mayr’s Introduction to the 1964 Harvard University Press publication of the 1859 ‘’Origin’’.] >



And in line with Wikipedia boldness policy, I now implement that change.

--Logicus (talk) 17:54, 7 May 2009 (UTC)


 * A rather long and repetitive talk page post, but a good point: Darwin continued to believe in "use and disuse inheritance" while rejecting Lamarck's other mechanisms and ideas. A small clarification – Darwin saw this as an evolutionary mechinism in addition to natural selection, not as an alternative form of selection. The idea was that use and disuse produced variations, which would then be subject to natural selection. Darwin was aware of how little was known of the source of variations, and felt that some adaptations would largely be due to use and disuse, while others were in whole or part due to natural selection from variations which had arisen at random or from unknown causes. Hope that helps clarify things, . . dave souza, talk 20:38, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Logicus to Dave souza:Thanks for this appreciative comment. However, unfortunately your doubtless well intended clarificatory points are largely and crucially mistaken. Please see my inserted counter-comments on them below.

On the issue of whether Darwin became a full Lamarckian in eventually making use/disuse rather than natural selection the most frequent selector in evolution since life began, in his post 1867 pangenesis theory of selective inheritance, it seems you have overlooked or misunderstood my comments to you of 21 and 24 April in Talk:Charles Darwin/Archive 8 in its section ‘Mentioning Darwin gave up natural selection and became a Lamarckian’. (My apologies if this title was misleading in creating the false impression it meant Darwin entirely dropped natural selection as an evolutionary selector at all, rather than dropping the theory that it has been the most frequent or most dominant selector, whilst yet maintaining it has been an important selector. But it should surely have been clear from my comments on the comparative frequency of use/disuse inherited selection and natural selection according to the Darwin's later theories that it only meant the latter.)

Let me here repeat Darlington's claim I posted in Talk:Charles Darwin/Archive 8 that Darwin gave up his theory that natural selection has been the main evolutionary selector in favour of a Lamarckian selector and summarise the present state of my analysis of its possible vindication:

"Let no one imagine, however, that, in the world of science, Darwin's theory has enjoyed an unchequered prosperity. On the contrary the dust of battle is only now beginning to settle on the hotly disputed ground....The most abiding source of trouble was that discovered by the Professor of Engineering at Edinburgh. Professor Fleming Jenkin pointed out in 1867, that any new variation appearing in one individual would be lost or swamped in later generations when that individual was compelled to cross with others of the old and established type, and its differences, as Darwin believed, blended in inheritance. Nature would never be able to keep any differences to select.

Darwin's defence against this objection was already prepared. He had hinted it in the first edition of The Origin of Species: at the end of the Introduction he had said that "Natural Selection has been the main but not exclusive means of modification." In later editions he hedged further. He fell back on the other means. These depended chiefly on the action of a changing environment: its direct effect in altering living things so as to suit it must be inherited. In adopting this view Darwin was giving up his own, and Wallace's, peculiar claim to originality: he was giving up the argument implied in the title of the book: and he was falling back on the...theory of Lamarck." [p. xvii On the Origin of Species by means of Natural Selection, first edition reprint in The Thinker's Library by Watts & Co, 1950.]

Now to summarise the latest outcome of my analysis of the literature on this issue, certainly inasmuch as Darwin always held that some evolutions have been caused solely by use/disuse inheritance selection without any natural selection, then if he also held that use/disuse has been a selecting cause in every evolution since life began according to his later pangenesis theory of selective inheritance, whether or not also accompanied by natural selection, this position entails that use/disuse has been the more frequent selector than natural selection since life began, and thus in this quantitative sense the main or most important selector historically.

Thus Darlington's thesis seems vindicated in this respect. So does Bowler or anybody else contend anywhere that Darwin came to hold use/disuse has been a less frequent selector than natural selection ?

And the practical purpose of this rather lengthy discussion is a proposal to report the view of some scholars that Darwin became a Lamarckian, albeit contested by others, to this article.

My inserted comments on yours:

A rather long and repetitive talk page post, but a good point: ['''FALSE, for there is no repetition here. Can you identify any, or is this yet more evidence of illiteracy ? The relative length of my posts is a function of the illiteracy of many Wiki editors of the ilk that have commented on my various proposals in Talk:Charles Darwin for improving the Darwin article. But whether they are longer than the average Wiki post on average, I have no idea. And nor, I suspect, do you. But thanks for acknowledging Logicus can make good points. This suggests you may not be completely ineducable, and may even come to realise that all my various points in Talk:Charles Darwin are also good points, and should be adopted. (-:  By the way, this is just the latest of Logicus's many repeated identifications of Original Research and failed verifications in Wikipedia history of science, and of their accepted correction.] Darwin continued to believe in "use and disuse inheritance" while rejecting Lamarck's other mechanisms and ideas. [FALSE, because he did not reject all of Lamarck's other ideas. For example he accepted Lamarck’s important innovation of simple to complex evolution rather than complex to simple, of evolution as natural law governed, and indeed of evolution and that of species itself.''']

A small clarification – Darwin saw this as an evolutionary mechinism in addition to natural selection, not as an alternative form of selection. ['''FALSE. From the very first edition of Origin Darwin gave various speculative examples of evolutions in which use/disuse was the only selector, without the assistance of any natural selection, and was thus an alternative form of selection to natural selection. See my comments of 8 May in Talk:Charles Darwin, in its section ‘Did Darwin give up his natural selection theory and become a Lamarckian ?’ ''']

The idea was that use and disuse produced variations, which would then be subject to natural selection. ['FALSE.This was certainly not the idea in the first edition of Origin'', in which some evolutions were said to be solely due to use/disuse. So the question here becomes whether Darwin ever changed his initial position that natural selection has played no role in some evolutions he identified, and provided alternative speculative natural selection explanations of those evolutions. What is your source for what seems to be your model of Darwin's pangenesis theory i.e. that from 1868 Darwin held that use/disuse selection was always subject to further natural selection, rather than sometimes the sole selector ?'''] Darwin was aware of how little was known of the source of variations, and felt that some adaptations would largely be due to use and disuse [and some others even solely due to use/disuse], while others were in whole or part due to natural selection from variations which had arisen at random or from unknown causes. Hope that helps clarify things,. .['''Well unfortunately it does not. Rather it surely just shows you have not been paying sufficiently close attention to my analyses of interpretational problems in evaluating the truth of Darlington's claim that Darwin became a Lamarckian. See my analyses of them of 21 and 24 April in Talk:Charles Darwin/Archive 8, in its section 'Mentioning Darwin gave up natural selection and became a Lamarckian’, and also of 8 May in reply to your acolyte Cashman in Talk:Charles Darwin in its section ‘Did Darwin give up his natural selection theory and become a Lamarckian ?'. I hope you will then be able to comment more relevantly about this issue, or else cease objecting to my proposed edits. The current leading question for you in this debate is whether you can falsify the claim that from 1868 onwards Darwin's theory of evolution was that use/disuse has been the more frequent selector than natural selection since life began, and whether you can find a reliable source for the claim that Darwin came to hold that all use/disuse selected variations have always also been subject to natural selection in all evolutions of species, rather than the sole selector in some cases, such as in Darwin's examples of the evolution of blindness in some creatures. To further clarify and sharpen this issue, we may identify at least 8 different versions D1, D2,.....D8 of Darwin's theory of evolution in its chronological serial development in the six different editions of Origin and the two different editions of Variations of Plants and Animals under Domestication between 1859 and 1875, in which D5 and D8 are the 1868 and 1875 two different editions of Variations and all the six other Dn are the six different editions of Origin. This question thus becomes whether Darwin's D5 to D8 theories of evolution from his adoption of pangenesis in D5 still held that use/disuse is the sole selector in some evolutions as in all previous versions, whereby natural selection has been a less frequent selector. Or was selection by use/disuse always accompanied by natural selection in Darwin's pangenesis theory ?'''] dave souza, talk 20:38, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

--Logicus (talk) 14:39, 10 May 2009 (UTC) }}

Citation needed
In the heading "Lamarckian Evolution" on this page, the statement:

Although he was not the first thinker to advocate organic evolution, he was the first to develop a truly coherent evolutionary theory[citation needed].

requires a citation. I'm a newbie and don't want to screw anything up, so I'm hoping someone else will edit the page for me...


 * Actually the citation for that statement had already been provided earlier in the article, after a similar statement. I have duplicated the citation. Dissembly (talk) 00:31, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

In the third edition of On the Origin of Species (Darwin, C. R. 1861. On the origin of species by means of natural selection, or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life. London: John Murray. 3d edition.), in the preface section "An historical sketch of the recent progress of opinion on The Origin of Species,"on p. xiii, Darwin writes:

The great majority of naturalists believe that species are immutable productions, and have been separately created. This view has been ably maintained by many authors. Some few naturalists, on the other hand, believe that species undergo modification, and that the existing forms of life have descended by true generation from pre-existing forms. … Lamarck was the first man whose conclusions on this subject excited much attention. This justly-celebrated naturalist first published his views in 1801, and he much enlarged them in 1809 in his 'Philosophie Zoologique,' and subsequently, in 1815, in his Introduction to his 'Hist, Nat. des Animaux sans Vertèbres.' In these works he upholds the doctrine that all species, including man, are descended from other species.

While this isn't exactly a citation for the actual page's statement that Lamarck was the first to "develop a truly coherent evolutionary theory" (of which statement I have no particular knowledge), it is a citation for the accurate statement that Lamarck was the first to engender widespread discussion on the topic, leading, eventually, to the Big Biology Debate (or, as Samuel Butler called it, "The Deadlock in Darwinism") over the veracity of Lamarckian or Darwinian evolution. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Hou68 (talk • contribs) 21:00, 14 July 2008 (UTC)


 * The entire article needs many more citations. There appears to be opinion and original research as well.LéVeillé 04:51, 18 January 2012 (UTC)

Botany
I just looked on IPNI today (30 mar 2012) and if you search for all names that he is an author of (excluding basionyms) you get 4095 from IK and 565 from the GCI. I think that some of these would not be accurate to use because they are either names where he is before the "ex" or they are for the species epithet and not the infraspecific epithet, but his estimated number of published plant names can be increased from 58.

On Tropicos.org I counted (30 Mar 2012) 63 moss names that Lam. is part of (not before the "ex" or in the basionym parentheses). This might be interesting to add.

I cannot determine an easy way through IndexFungorum to count the number of fungal names he published. There also does not seem to be a simple way on Index Hepaticarum to determine the number of hepatic names he may have published — Preceding unsigned comment added by HerbTricoter (talk • contribs) 19:42, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Epigenetics
A contributor has insisted upon re-introducing this topic as if it were a justification of Lamarkian inheritance. The article referred to does say:
 * "Epigenetic mechanisms leave DNA sequence unaltered but can affect DNA by preventing the expression of genes. "
 * "These studies do not demonstrate inheritance between generations"
 * "To get to the issue of the more extreme variations of soft inheritance, it has to be determined whether the environment can induce an epigenetic change in an organism that can be inherited in subsequent generations. Certainly, nobody has shown that an epigenetically induced beneficial or adaptive change has been inherited."

The sentence under discussion says
 * "However, in the field of Epigenetics, there is growing evidence that soft inheritance play a part in changing of some organisms DNA and maybe transmitted to later generations."

Which is just what the reference does not say. That is why I reverted the change. Macdonald-ross (talk) 07:22, 15 August 2010 (UTC)


 * I corrected that wording before you posted, its late and I had to run threw a few different sentences and kept hitting the save instead of the preview: it might help to add some text that these changes are not inherited, but I think that is implied when it says that the DNA is not changed. Hardyplants (talk) 07:27, 15 August 2010 (UTC)


 * While writing this, text changed to acknowledge that only expression of genes may be altered. I still think it may go too far, because adaptive change was what L. talked about, but have not reverted it. Macdonald-ross (talk) 07:33, 15 August 2010 (UTC)


 * When Lamarck proposed his ideas of adaptive change, people did not know about inheritance of DNA or a fixed genotype. This is a type of adaptive change but it so far does not seem to be a heritable one in any organisms studied so far.  Hardyplants (talk)


 * I'm happy to leave the text as it is now. I should have been more generous about your re-edit: it was well done, especially as you did it before my little rant. Macdonald-ross (talk) 11:03, 15 August 2010 (UTC)
 * For what it is worth I agree the current wording is not bad. However, there are reliable sources that suggest that epigenetic inheritance can play a role in adaptation to the environment, and that in some cases this might possibly effect evolution in a Lamarckian fashion. Here are a few I found when discussing this topic in history of evolutionary thought:, , ]. This is all still quite preliminary of course, but it might be Ok to add some wording a long the lines: "Some biologists have gone as far as suggesting that such soft epigenetic inheritance might contribute to adapting phenotypes to environmental conditions in a way reminiscent of Lamarckian evolution." I think sources could be found that would support that. Rusty Cashman (talk) 03:34, 16 August 2010 (UTC)
 * As an encyclopedia, we should stay out of unresolved current controversies. There is not a single case of an epigenetic effect having any evolutionary consequences: it is all supposition. As for revivifying Lamark, how many times has that been promised and failed? If a significant epigenetic change is demonstrated which is continually heritable, that would be interesting. We could rethink the issue then. Macdonald-ross (talk) 18:08, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

I can't quite swallow "As an encyclopedia, we should stay out of unresolved current controversies", which is against the spirit of wikipedia and the letter of WP:WEIGHT, which encourages articles to cover unresolved controversies by summerizing minority viewpoints in the field (without giving the impression they are mainstream or consensus viewpoints). I think that at this point the idea that epigenetic effects may be influencing evolution easily meets the threshold of being a minority rather than a fringe view. However, you may be right that this article is not the right place to go into it. To date most of the speculation about epigenetic mechanisms affecting evolution have focused on environmental stress selectively increasing mutation rates for certain genes, and the idea that a genome may code for multiple versions of the phenotype depending on environementally triggered gene expression with the state of the switches sometimes reflecting the enviromental conditions encountered by parents or grand parents rather than just the environment of the developing organism. Neither of these effects really matches the ideas of Lamarck (and his contemporaries) or those of the neo-Lamarkians, which were much more about use and disuse of organs. Rusty Cashman (talk) 02:42, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

Neither epigenetics or soft inheritance belongs in this article.LéVeillé 04:52, 18 January 2012 (UTC)


 * I second this. Epigenetics has repeatedly been described as Lamarckian, but there is no basis for this at all.  No serious work has suggested that environmental effects that bring about epigenetic changes tend to produce changes that are adaptive more often than they produce maladaptive changes. And no role for use or disuse of organs has been suggested by research on epigenetics.   So saying that epigenetic changes are a Lamarckian mechanism is simply wrong.  (Happy 268th Birthday to Lamarck, though).   Felsenst (talk) 12:26, 1 August 2012 (UTC)

Geographical note
'After his father died in 1760, Lamarck bought himself a horse, and rode across the country to join the French army, which was in Germany at the time.' As this is the 1700s, shouldn't Germany be Prussia?86.17.247.50 (talk) 15:46, 6 December 2014 (UTC)

Help on Environmental Determinism page
Hello Wikipedians,

I am a Columbia University student working on the environmental determinism page. We include a discussion of Lamarck under the "Western imperialism and colonization" subheading. Check it out and add to the talk page if you think his theory is summarized wrongly there. I added our page to the "see also" on this one.

--Sarah Whittenburg (talk) 18:47, 7 May 2016 (UTC)